"I heard you just now tell her that it could not be that you could think of her--as things are."
Then I remembered what my last words had been, and I saw that they might easily have misled him after all the trouble he seemed to have had.
"You heard too much or too little," said I, being minded to laugh, though the matter was over serious to him to let me do so. "I spoke of my own troubles, which were the less because my fortunes prevent my thinking of any maiden, seeing that I have no home to give a wife when I find her. You were wrong in thinking that I spoke of Sexberga--I spoke, as you might have known, of the one whom I have lost."
"How should I know that? I know nought of your affairs."
Then thought I to myself that I would punish Sexberga, for she had tortured this honest lover of hers over much.
"I will not tell you that tale. Ask Sexberga, who has known it from the first."
Then I was sorry for what I had said, for he flushed darkly.
"I have been made a fool of," he said.
"Nay; but you should have been more trustful," said I. "Now, were I in your place, I would go home to Dallington and bide there for a week, and the maiden will be pleased enough to see you when you return. And if she tries to make you jealous again, seem to mind it not. There is little sport in it for her then."
"I suppose there would not be," said he, and he began to look more cheerful.